Night
by balfies
Summary: "You alright?" I ask. "No." She is very matter-of-fact. She looks back out the window. "Neither am I." / In the stolen nights before the Games begin, Clove and Cato speak without talking, and love without barriers.


I go to her room on the first night. Her sheets are pulled from her bed, twisting in a labyrinth to the window. Her costume from the parade is in pieces all over the floor, and the chest of drawers looks as though it has been ransacked. I hear a splash of water from her bathroom, and walk towards the open door.

She is clothed in a thin white nightdress, and is heaving over the filled sink. Her hands grip each side of the basin so hard that her knuckles are white. She is coughing and retching and cursing. Her deep black hair is swept over her left shoulder, the tips of it brushing against the surface of the water in the sink. She stands upright and starts when she sees my reflection in the mirror.

"How long have you been there?" she accuses.

"Not long."

"Well, I'm fine."

"No, you're not."

"I'm not weak, Cato."

"No. You're not."

Clove pushes past me and stretches out on her bed face down.

I take it as my cue to leave.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

It is much later. The night, a deep ink colour back home, is paler from the lights of the Capitol parties. I cannot sleep.

I find myself at her door.

I stand there for ten minutes. I could knock.

A bored voice to the right says, "Are you going to go in there to find me, or do I have to let you in myself?"

Clove sits curled up, leaning her head against the window. The shadows have hidden her. I turn around and slide down the door. A short smile passes over her face. She doesn't look at me, concentrating on the extravagant city spread out beneath her.

"It's different to how they said it would be," she murmurs.

"What is?" But I know what she means. Looking at the faces you'll have to kill, and hoping they won't kill you. Not that they'd have much of a chance against me.

There is a silence.

"So, how's _Glimmer_?" she mocks.

I chuckle. "Jealous?"

"You wish, Cato."

She pulls her knees into her body a bit more.

"She's giggly and precocious and abhorrent," I say.

"Really? She seems like your type."

"Yeah, my type has more than two brain cells to rub together."

She looks at me. The city lights tangle in her hair and dance across her milky skin. I shiver slightly.

"You alright?" I ask.

"No." She is very matter-of-fact.

She looks back out the window.

"Neither am I." I rest my head back against her door. I feel her slip down next to me and lean her head against my shoulder. I close my eyes. Her fingers knit into mine.

We both know.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

The next night, I don't go to find her. She slips into my bed silently.

She looks like she is asleep when I breathe a compliment into the air.

She smiles, and whispers back, "And I'm lethal too."

"My favourite combination."

"Cato, there's something wrong with us."

"I know."

She sleeps with her small, deadly hands cradling her face, turned towards me. I barely sleep, but I don't care.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

She climbs in between my sheets before I do. She lies there, eyes wide open. I slide in next to her.

"I hate this," I murmur to her.

"It's everything we worked for."

"So why is it killing me inside? Training used to be my way out and I feel like I'm cracking open and I hate this."

"Don't say that, Cato. Don't you dare, we can't be seen as weak."

"Being scared is not being weak. Being scared will keep us going. And I'm not going to look weak in front of the others. Plus, it's pretty difficult for me to look weak."

"I can tell," she says.

She crawls closer to me. Her body is slight. It burns like ice against me.

"Clove, I–"

"Stop talking. You sound less intelligent every time you do."

I smile into her hair.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

I have awoken from a falling-dream when she visits me the next night. She hardly tips the bed with her weight as she perches next to me and kisses me. I kiss her back, and pull her closer by her waist. She doesn't resist. We fall asleep with our foreheads touching.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

There is a desperation in her as she crashes her body into mine the next night. Two days until the Games and my whole body can only absorb Clove's fierce embrace. She needs my strength. I need her determination. She needs my words. I just need her. I press myself against her, trying to sew our flesh together so we are one whole. She claws at my neck and drags her nails through my hair and breathes into my mouth as she crushes herself against me.

I don't melt into her; I burn into her.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

The next night we are both furious and passionate. 12 somehow scored an 11, and sponsors are slipping out of our grasp.

She storms into my room after dinner and we shout at each other for an hour. We don't care how many Capitol objects are broken, but by the end we are both curled up in a corner, surrounded by glass, holding onto each other. Her nails dig into me and I grasp her too tightly, but the pain relaxes us both.

We awake the next morning, clinging to the other's bruised form, drowning in bedsheets and love and hopelessness.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

The Games interrupt our cycle.

*O*O*O*O*O*O*O*

**A/N: It's been a while. Good Morning. I've just been sobbing over numerous Clato fics for the past two days, and then this happened.**


End file.
